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Gene Odening interview, pt. 4 – “Beyond the Trivium” – #133

This episode is an interview with Gene Odening, pt. 4 titled “Beyond the Trivium” and is being released on Sunday, January 08, 2012. My interview with Gene was recorded on Saturday, January 07, 2012.

Happy New Year, everyone, we’ve made it to 2012, and Terence McKenna’s end of the world is soon upon us, or so we’re to believe.

But today I’ve got someone very special for you, someone who’ll help you see through all of the bs. Today, for our episode #133, the long awaited Gene Odening is back to teach us about what lies beyond the trivium. We’ll be discussing the difference between Plato and Aristotelian philosophy, as well as teaching the trivium to children.

This is the story of the 3 successive stages of the “Philosophic Life” which almost all of us live. Some of us live it consciously, others, not so much.
Gene’s story is one of good fortune. Early in adolescence he was given the tools to recognize and to pursue the Philosophic Life, which he undertook to do, not as a vocation but as a serious hobbyist. This is part of what the talk is about, defining those tools and following time-tested ways of applying them.
Gene lived through the first part, the Stage of Preparing For Life, in a fashion which the ancient Vedic Sages called: “Learning by grazing through the fields of the Brahma (the Creator God), in sobriety, and with a guru”. He even had his own guru! He graduated from this stage in a less than sober state. At age 18 . . . He ingested the Eucharist in fact, rather than only in effigy, and had his Crown Chakra opened.
When he was 20 years old, he began the second part, the Stage of Receiving From Life. This is when he began his vocational career and started his family life. Life was good. He and his wife traveled many parts of the English speaking world scouring the libraries in particular; she reading her beloved fiction; he in the reference and antiquarian sections. His quest was to find out what Money was. Money is a very elusive thing. As ghostly as it is, it takes up much of our life’s time and energy. By happenstance, in pursuit of its secrets, almost all other known topics come into view for a closer examination, including Philosophy, a treasure beyond measure.
As he reached the age of about 56, he had the realization that he was now in the final stage, the Stage of Giving Back To Life. This is when one should properly become the elder advisor, not ‘offering’ advise, but giving of it freely when asked. It is also the time of beginning one’s journey through mentality. This is the time of: “Examining a life which has been worth living”, as the Greek sage Socrates counceled.

Terence Mckenna, when speaking of the Timewave did talk about the concresence of timespace but also was open enough to not take himself so seriously as to state that yes, absolutely it would be the end of the world. I have heard many talks where Terence said he did not know what was going to happen and even not to listen to him and that it was all a great mystery and open to interpretation, maybe metaphorical. Also I do not believe anyone has successfully debunked his mathematical algorithm of which he stated he hoped someone would. I have also heard you mention in a talk with John Rush that Terence got his idea of the 2012 end date from Rod Serling’s In Search Of… and I’m wondering, Jan, where you got this piece of information? Did Dennis tell you this? It’s quite a bold assertion to make if you are just speculating, and one that does not seem to conform to your Trivium based philosophy. I would love for you to answer this question.

I’m very well familiar with the religions that Terence proposed. In fact, the huge majority of audio files out there of him came from my personal archives. And no, Terence does NOT conform to the trivium or critical thinking. Terence sold a lot of BS and really helped to misguide and misdirect the entire field of psychedelic studies. Worst of all is his 2012 nonsense that we have to hear about every day, and all of the people that worship him uncritically…

Of course I’m very dismissive of about 50% of what he put out – because it’s bullshit. Terence was a story teller indeed. But the problem comes in when people accept his ideas uncritically and as truth and go around defending everything he had to say, even to the very people who made his work available to people like you. (see the SWR archives, this is where most TM came from: http://www.gnosticmedia.com/store/)

Terence deserves what ever the fruits of his work are. If he planted the seeds of bullshit, he grew bullshit. If you want to consume that bullshit, it’s up to you, but it’s still bullshit. Try using the trivium and then go through his work again and see how he’s mislead people with many of these nonsense ideas, like 2012. Even his Food of the Gods is not very accurate.

I certainly give Terence credit for the “insights” I’ve gotten from him. Why don’t you see that? In fact, that’s exactly what you’re criticizing here…my insights.

I’ve already had Terence’s brother on my show and we already discussed much of this. So why not get fluent in the trivium and critical thinking and the fallacies and stop worshiping and defending the guy who sold a lot of BS in his stories? Take what’s valid, point by point, and toss the rest.

I think those who think there’s a lot to learn there are easily fooled into believing bullshit… he was a story teller. Not a seller of fact or history of even accurate psychedelic information – for the most part.

Terence isn’t alive and I’ll be happy to point out his bullshit anyway…just as anyone else… regardless if it’s 2012 or what ever other appeal to fallacies you want to use to justify bs. Dennis even came on my show and admitted that Terence eventually just sold the idea because it became popular…

You don’t believe his math was debunked because you haven’t studied anything on it and you’re here to protect your religion. Terence was approached on the matter before his death and admitted, to his credit, that it was likely wrong. There’s an article out there, we published reference to it in A&S, so you should do your grammar / research first before leaping to conclusions. And the onus of proof was on Mckenna to back each theory. But regardless, his religious believers still go around and act as though he wasn’t debunked and still sell his religion like those damned Mormons banging on your door at 8am… ready to jump and defend the bullshit should anyone call it out. http://www.levity.com/eschaton/Watkinsobj.html

If you don’t think what I’ve said conforms the the trivium, it’s because you haven’t done your own grammar, haven’t studied it seriously, haven’t listened to the 3 2012 meme shows we did (much less the other 50+ interviews on entheogens), haven’t heard my interview with his brother, and haven’t really done any research at all to verify your beliefs. So rather than doing that on your own, you’ve come here to waste my time with this nonsense about your religious saint. Good luck with that. You won’t get any sympathy from me.

Hello Jan and world! Greetings nice to catch up here of this awesome website, was looking at New World Next Week and thought that hey they should apply more the Trivium. Plus did remind me of the Peace Revolution podcast of Peace Revolution 004: Exploring Media and Educating Ourselves to Live vs. Amusing Ourselves to Death, which must say people should check out have heard it more than 5 times in one year pure epicness. Thought they would use it since they got a taste of it by Richard Groove, hope he doing well.

Here a question thou Jan, what about Dr Dennis Jon Mckenna? Do see that some pod cast with him do exist here, so what Trivium and Quadrivium even filters do we get on him as an output result?

Let me make a few corrections here. No doubt Terence did say many times as well that the world could would come to an end but in a way as to say, as I heard it anyway, “as we know it”. Also in reference to my statement “and one that does not seem to conform to your Trivium based philosophy”, I would like to replace the word “does” with the word ‘would’ as I am not suggesting that you are wrong, just that I would like to know if this is in fact truth or just a speculation and as of now I do not know. So the line would read (and one that would not seem to conform to your Trivium based philosophy) I am not attacking you here Jan and I like your program, but I have over the years heard you go on about Terence in short flippant ways and not fully explaining your issues with him – just nonchalantly throwing it out there and it comes across very dismissive where Terence is concerned. This is disheartening to me because if there are people listening to you who have not heard Terence it seems it would lead them away from ever hearing his great insights and perspective, which I feel would be a shame. Terence was a great thinker and yes a great story teller, no doubt, but whenever I have heard you speak of him it comes across disdainfully and I think Terence now 12 years in the grave deserves better than that. Do you not owe any of your insights and perspectives to him? Why don’t you do a show on Terence and get this off your chest and see what your listeners responses might be. I think we may all learn a lot about him in such a format. After all, it is 2012 and a time Terence really should have been alive to see and speak for himself when the end date comes. That is a shame. Hopefully Dennis’ book will somehow vicariously let Terence come through to give his final word on the subject. It would be great if Gnostic Media and other venues like yours would celebrate, pro and con, a great part of the human counter cultural movement such as the phenomena of Terence Mckenna.

hello Jan, been wanting to talk to you for some time now. since discovering your work a few years ago i have been fascinated by what you are (for lack of a better word) teaching all of us. I heard your podcast on the joe rogan show and loved every second of it! i feel like a sponge that is soaking up information, and i cannot get enough!! I reccomended you to Mike Ruppert who runs a website called collapsenet(not sure if you’re familiar with him, he wrote “crossing the rubicon” which i cannot reccomend enough to you Jan and he wrote a book called “collapse” and stared in the documentary of the same name. i beg you to at least give a listen to what he is talking about. he is also very into shaminism and gaianisn(not sure if i spelled that right)he believes that the earth is alive and consious(spelling)anywho i highly reccomend his work, he also has a radio program on sun nights at 8central on the progressiveradionetwork(gary nulls site i think). I feel very connected to people like yourself Jan, ive done psychedelics and love them not as a recreational drug but as a way to expand your mind and truly find yourself and your place in this universe, we are all really one and that is mind blowing when you really think about it. i would love to take some more (i believe that im in a place in my life where i think that psychedelics are again a tool for spiritual enlightenment which i feel that i need at this point in time, ive got questions that i believe shroom or another psychedelic will answer or at least point me in the right direction.)Your podcasts have been more than informative and cannot stop learing everything that i can about the trivium, quadrivium and anything else that i might be missing(WYBM!)ive shown your documentary the pharmacratic inquisition to some friends and they called me up the next day and wanted more info(at times i feel like an addict that cannot get enough!! ha!) they also could not believe what has been hidden from them but staring them in the face all of their lives. everything that we have been taught and told from birth is a lie! pisses me off somethin fierce man! i have two young children and since they were born i have sworn off ALL public schooling, but with not beeing very familiar with the trivium and quadrivium am not sure how to teach it to my babies, they will be learing this philosophy of life not fractional reserve banking compound interest and infinite growth. i am looking very foreward to this podcast so that i may learn some tips to teaching it to my family and frieds(always wanted to be a teacher anyway, just didnt want to sit in a damn college for 4 years for a piece of paper that says i can now teach! what a bunch of bs!! aristotle and socrates didnt need a fuckin piece of paper neither do i!!)anyway i know im rambeling but i just wanted to thank you so much for what you are doing and if you are ever in kansas for anyreason i would love to meet you, i believe that we would have alot in common. anyway please keep up what you are doing and hopefully ill keep learing! take care of yourself man!! (ps i suggested to mike ruppert that you be a guest on his radio show, perhaps you could have him on yours as well!)

Of course Terence wasn’t 100% correct. No one CAN be. And even if MOST of what he talked about is BS, I don’t think you are being fair dismissomg him the way you are doing…

You might be right. But instead of just brushing it away by saying “you haven’t done your grammar correctly”, please share the grammar… links, books. Otherwise you’re just being arrogant.

Are you saying he was some sort of con-artist, deliberately trying to misinform people? In that case, I might agree with your critisism. Otherwise.. I would say that the problem is peoples inability to use the Trivium correctly, rather than Terence. With the same logic you could dismiss anyone who isn’t 100% correct ALL THE TIME.

I’m not saying you’re wrong. But please provide more, than smirky comments if you really feel that Terence is so full of BS. I’d be really interested in hearing a show where you get into the nitty gritty…

I don’t buy into the Timewave-stuff… but why are you endorsning people like Michael Tsarion in that case? He’s also very much into 2012…

There’s a search feature in the upper left. I already did 3 shows on him and 2012. Not to mention that the huge amount of other researchers from the field that I’ve interviewed here paint a much clearer picture of the overall problem.

I would say if not a con-artist, at least a sophist poet, happy to sell tickets for a popular item like 2012.

Terence took advantage of people’s wantonness to hear a story, and he told lots of stories. As a story teller I think he’s fantastic. But as a psychedelic researcher, he’s one of the lesser accurate.

And I never said anything about being 100% correct. I think I put the number closer to 50% correct. Yup, that’s exactly what I said: “Of course I’m very dismissive of about 50% of what he put out – because it’s bullshit.”

And where does “I don’t support 50% of McKenna’s work” lead you to Tsarion? Nice red herring. I base things on a case by case, point by point basis. And Tsarion wasn’t here to discuss 2012, he was here to discuss mushrooms and some of his discoveries. If he brought up 2012 I’d have laid into him too. What’s the point of your fallacy here anyway?

No wantonness is what he meant. They’re desire (or more accurately, wantonness) to hear a story for no need or reason other than to be told a story. And how can either of those meanings be a noun? the first one is clearly an adjective and the second one is a verb… It’s a shame how twisted the dictionary has gotten. Try breaking the habit of repeating what you read or are told and use your judgment a little more… remember that with any power comes some responsibility

Haven’t listened to the interview yet, but a friend told me it was great. exited to check it out, the episodes 49,50,51, really changed my outlook. i introduced my friend to it, told him to learn it, as he has a child, and they need to be helped, since school is so fd up. anyways, congrats jan on all your awesome work.

isn’t it amazing how people jump to all sorts of conclusions? are you “endorsing” michael tsarion? is that what it means when, at the beginning of your show you state these are not the views of the host, etc, etc? amazing really, how this 2012 meme has caught on. i mean i haven’t heard tsarion mention 2012 in like 2 or 3 years, yet its what gets brought up time and again. and dont lets get started on the reptilians, eh? how many times do i have to hear about how tsarion believes in reptilians? does he really? dont you think this is a little silly? lets see where it is said by tsarion that he believes in 2012, or reptilians. show me the quote. it wont happen because it doesn’t exist.

the trivium teaches first off, to get your data, check facts, find information. people who just to these conclusions are taking someone elses rhetoric as fact, data, information. I wish some of these dumbass, ad hominem, smartalecky, brainiacs, would read some of tsarions actual words, or yours jan. but characters like mckenna and the above mentioned mike ruppert are better suited to them, as they tell them the doom, or the pleasant wiedness they want to hear so badly. and they dont need to present facts to back up their statements because they are sophists, like you say.

just tell me one thing, guy, where does tsarion endorse 2012? tell me another, other guy, what would mike ruppert want with the trivium? it might poke holes in his doom outline for future history.

hey if you can point out some fallacies in what mike ruppert is saying im all ears. i do admit that im very new at the trivium study and intend to learn as much as possible, as i said to my girlfriend last night in lieu of my decision to teach the trivium to my young children, i have alot of work to do. However from what i can understand Mike Ruppert is simply stating facts, peak oil is real. Im no more a fan of doom and gloom, unless however it is real. the world today is not a very nice place and im not sure what learning as much about that as you can is a bad thing. i dont believe in ignoring the problem i belive in looking at it analyzing it and making an informed decision based on ALL available informantion (as i said im new at the trivium method i do believe however that i intuitively understood that there was another way of learing since i was very young which i believe is why im a litte smarter than the average bear, i knew instinctivly that there was something eles better, i just never new that it was the trivium until very recently)from what i can gather that is exactlly what Mike Ruppert is doing. Again what is wrong with dealing with the doom and gloom if it is literally right in your face? should we not accept that the world is what it is and preparing for inevitability of collapse is not an appropriate response? As I said Im all ears for another analysis of the situation that dosent take the world social/political realaties into consideration. I encourage discussion on this matter as i said im open to any and all analysis and i will continue my studies of the trivium with much vigor. Thank you again for everything that you do Jan, take care!

sorry for coming off so agressively. i have to admit I’ve only listened to a few interviews with ruppert. but from what i have heard every time he basically says there is NOTHING that can be done. basically we’re screwed. similar in format to say clif high, if you are familiar? i also read an article years back pointing to some sneaky shenanigans on his part. and for what it’s worth i don’t know if “peak oil” is a fact at all. the idea has been around for a long time. books have been written outlining the idea that we need to go back to a low tech, agrarian society, but which can only support like less than a tenth of the current population.

no need to apologize, im not familiar with clif high but will research, it seems to me that the link you presented is full of alot of abiotic oil non sense, (seems non sense to me anyway), it is however irrelevint, peak oil is a fact weather the oil is abiotic or not, the idea was first presented by M King Hubbard(hope i got that right) who correctly predicted americas and the worlds peak oil way back in ’49 i think, so yeah the idea has been around for sometime, but it has been proven to myself atleast that he was right when he said the world oil reserves will peak in the early 21st century. Just look at what is happening on the world state in the last few years, we are literally positioning ourselves around the worlds oil reserves in the middle east/north africa region. A very telling picture is painted when in the early 2000’s a very few of Dick Cheneys NEPDG(nation energy policy development group whos secrets are vast)documents were released and one was a map of the world oil reserves and Mike brilliantly overlaid a map of our major military bases around the world and it was very clear to him and myself that we were circling the worlds oil with our military. As I said I dont follow anyone with blind faith and am always openmined for any discussion but Mike Ruppert is onto something and so far he hasent steered me anything but straight. Another point id like to quickly dispell from the provided link was that of Mikes so called “die-off”. It seems to me that the authors of those articles dont realize that in any animal/viral/bacterical population boom that goes vertical very quickly, also plummits just as fast. The earths population was stable for thousands of years at around a billion people give or take, (also account for major plagues, ie. Justinian, and the Black Plague, those events of course altered the population drastically but only for a few generations at best)as soon as we discovered oil, (“fossil fuels”)our population went from about a billion to 7 billion in about 150 years. That should speak volumes by itself. A die off is inevitible as the rain. Mike Ruppert (as far as i can tell) is a great human being and has a good heart, a pure heart,(he is very into native american spirituallity and believes as i do taht this earth is alive and consious)he no more wants billions of people to die than anyone eles he is simply saying that it is going to happen and we are going to have to deal with that and with what we as humans(symbiots with this planet)have done to our home, our mother earth. No one wants death(well…)but we do have to prepare for the inevitable collapse of our industrial civilization, humans will survive of course but the sub species of petroleum man is doomed. (colin cambpell i think said that, a hero of the peak oil movement). I invite any discussion/rebuttal. I also emplore you to read Mike Rupperts books Crossing the Rubicon where he lays out what has happened what is happening and what is to come with our society. Also his book “Confronting Collapse” is a template for what needs to be done to save as many humans as possible from collapse, if you want the short short version you can always just watch his amazing documentary “Collapse”. Made me weep the first time I saw it (when he started talking about all of us wanting to be at home when we die, i just lost it)Anyway im sure im rambleing but i cannot reccomend enough his work, In my opinion it is just as important and signifigant as Jan’s work to all humanity. Thanks all.

Thanks for the link. I never buy into scarcity. It’s a man made phenomenon. There’s always enough for everyone.
here’s a link to a good video that debunks global warming. They also have a great video explaining evolution for any of you struggling to explain it to people that believe in “adam and eve”

I haven’t joined in a conversation here before, because a lot of what is presented in Jan’s interviews has been outside the scope of my studies and as a result I haven’t had the time to verify the relevant facts for myself. I believe that the practice of verification is crucial to being able to engage in a constructive conversation.

Jan is only human, Gene Odening is only human, Terrance McKenna is only human… To err is to human; but to criticise without having done research is an error in and of itself. I said this in order to provide the following caveat: I am not an authority on McKenna, the trivium or the 2012 meme – but I am writing here to ask some basic questions in order to build some sort of context for this debate, and also to attempt to take some of the heat out – lets grill the ideas not each other!

In regard to Terrance McKenna – Jan has already expressed this idea assertively, there are a number of shows that have been done about the 2012 meme and McKenna, and Jan is one of the few people providing access to his thoughts in their entirity through the “She Who Remember’s Archive”. There is nothing wrong with listening to McKenna, or entertaining his ideas, but caution is perhaps advised before we create dogma. McKenna operated in another time with other cultural structures – so we need to ask if there was a reason for him to deliberately bullshit in order to pioneer a mass market. In other words what is the context? Jan, would you agree that McKenna has significance in context?

Let’s take a little bit of the heat out of the debate here by asking some basic questions (and remember I could be wrong too.),

a) Does Terrance Mckenna’s work add or detract from your own studies? This will be answered differently for every person.

b) What methodology are you using to test McKenna’s content as he presents it?

c) What contextual frame work are you encorporating McKenna into?

d) What are the implications of McKenna upon the existing body of work, and how does it change it.

Now all that aside the next way to look at McKenna and the 2012 meme is from a historicity point of view: “Regardless of whether the work is true or false, good or bad – what is the impact it has had on society, and can it be improved?

As far as the trivium method goes, I would be hard pressed to suggest an alternative method of study that will yeild better results, so whether or not Terrance did or did not conform to the Trivium method is irrelevant, if you as a student are using the trivium then you should be able to efficiently extract the core knowledge out of anyones work and apply it to your own.

Wow Jan wasn’t expecting the harsh attack just for asking a few simple questions, one of which is pertinent that you cleverly dodged and did not answer. Questions are what I raised, not critiques as you accused me of. Seems like Terence is quite a sore spot for you like the missing scale in Smaugs belly. So since you’ve decided to attack me this way why don’t we just purge this thing right now and let me enlighten you to a few ways in which you are dead wrong.

First off and to quote;
“But the problem comes in when people accept his ideas uncritically and as truth and go around defending everything he had to say, even to the very people who made his work available to people like you.”

I am not the blind gullible follower you have you have made me out to be nor do I look to Terence as some sort of religious messiah nor did I try to defend anything he said. I have taken issue with many things he has proposed since I understood long ago that the realms he was speaking in was largely speculation not fact, the Timewave included. And yes, I am aware that it was you who so graciously and unselfishly seeded Mckenna to the internet. This is gloating I have heard you go on about many times now – let it lay, everyone knows already. Or maybe this is why you are so adamantly against him in the first place – because you feel somewhat responsible for spreading to so many the illogical and uncritical religion of Terence Mckenna.

I didn’t criticize you. I ASKED you some questions. Maybe you should re-read and re-check the way you lambasted me without provocation. And I don’t know, call me blind but I have not seen or heard you credit him for anything- that’s why I don’t see it and the reason for my QUESTIONS.

To continue;
“I’ve already had Terence’s brother on my show and we already discussed much of this. So why not get fluent in the trivium and critical thinking and the fallacies and stop worshiping and defending the guy who sold a lot of BS in his stories? Take
what’s valid, point by point, and toss the rest”

Again let my words and yours speak for themselves. I did not defend/worship. This is hilarious. And speaking of Dennis and your interview, why didn’t you confront him on HIS part of the Timewave. To remind you, as you must have forgotten when you interviewed him, there is a book called The Invisible Landscape in which he co-authored/calculated the premise for the Timewave Zero.

To quote;
“Terence isn’t alive and I’ll be happy to point out his bullshit anyway…just as anyone else… regardless if it’s 2012 or what ever other appeal to fallacies you want to use to justify bs. Dennis even came on my show and admitted that Terence eventually just sold the idea because it became popular”.
!?! This baffles be.

More;
“You don’t believe his math was debunked because you haven’t studied anything on it and you’re here to protect your religion. Terence was approached on the matter before his death and admitted, to his credit, that it was likely wrong.”

I am well aware of the Japanese mathematician who found a problem with his math and yes, Terence was thrilled and I believe, invited him to Hawaii to discuss. I am also aware that a year or so later another mathematics professor found flaws in that guys findings seemingly opening the thing back up (and this before Terence died) – but since I don’t understand high mathematics there is no way for me to conclude either way. I will try to resource that material and send to you. And again with your unfounded assumptions, I am not defending (or protecting, even more hilarious) a religion. You are some piece of work.

Still more!!;

“If you don’t think what I’ve said conforms the the trivium, it’s because you haven’t done your own grammar, haven’t studied it seriously, haven’t listened to the 3 2012 meme shows we did (much less the other 50+ interviews on entheogens), haven’t heard my interview with his brother, and haven’t really done any research at all to verify your beliefs. So rather than doing that on your own, you’ve come here to waste my time with this nonsense about your religious saint. Good luck with that. You won’t get any sympathy from me.

You ASSUME I have not listened to all these other podcasts – I have followed your work since the release of The Pharmacratic Inquisition, collected and listened to (many of them multiple times) every single episode you have posted or been on. I have purchased and read both of your books including my original copy of SMATC and many many other books on the subject (I have a sizeable library). Beyond that, I have donated to your site and archives and bought merchandise. I have turned friends and family onto your podcast who have in turn done the same. I have done my share to support what you do sir. And, to backtrack, speaking of your shows, are you actually suggesting that in order to get the truth the whole truth and nothing but – everyone is supposed to check here and let that be the final word? There is nothing but absolute truth here? Sorry man, but that sounds a bit ego-centric and you may want to keep that kind of talk in check.

I have researched plenty and pondered much more than I will give you the pleasure of knowing because I see now how you deal with things. You cannot even deal with simple questions without assassinating someones character that you don’t even know and make multiple unfounded mean spirited assumptions about them. It’s exactly like Rush Limbaugh or an angry teenager when they get cornered with a question they cannot answer and have nowhere to turn but to insults, sarcasm and deformation of the initial point. This is what the Trivium has taught you? You have revealed your transparency at my expense and since we are on the subject, I will gladly don the hunch back cape and climb upon the pillory of the Terence Mckenna whipping post and let the cat-o-nine tails and flesh and blood fly if you, Mr. Irvin will don the cape of the sacred Trivium and answer the one question you so cleverly dodged to begin with – From what source did you derive that Terence Mckenna got his idea of the Timewave end date 2012 from Rod Serlings In Search Of… then go on to seed that information to the world in your talk with John Rush. Please answer this one question, if you can. I wonder if you will even have the balls to post this, to answer the question. Or is this the loose pebble keystone in the crumbling foundation that the house of cards that is the Superstar Jan Irvin rests upon?

“Good luck with that.”

p.s. I do not require sympathy from someone who is seemingly unable to give it in the first place. A little humility and compassion goes a long way. Try practicing that for awhile and incorporate it into your Trivium method.

Hi Mike, since you insist on continuing to waste our time with non-trivium related material, I suppose I’ll have to reply again.

“Wow Jan wasn’t expecting the harsh attack just for asking a few simple questions, one of which is pertinent that you cleverly dodged and did not answer.”

Did I dodge one? Where? It wasn’t intentional. I woke up to your nonsense email whining about Terence first thing in the AM, rather than focusing on what was being taught in the interview, making this whole thread here about Terence, rather than the trivium – based off one comment about his 2012 nonsense at the beginning. I would say I was annoyed, not dodging anything.

If you’re saying I’m non-chalantly throwing it out there, well, I’ve covered the issues with his work, as I already explained, in more than 50 interviews on this show, for starters. I’ve covered the 2012 BS in 3 shows specifically. Again, already mentioned.

My entire goal is to lead people away from hearing Terence if they’ve not first studied the trivium, because he’ll waste their time and mislead them into lala land and they’ll end up like Joe Rogan preaching the unfounded 2012 meme all over the place, wasting their and everyone else’s time. That’s exactly what I want, and in retrospection, I’d probably have never released those archives of him due to the damage they’ve caused, creating a massive herd of uncritical hippies that buy just about anything because it sounds groovy from the mouth of McKenna.

Great thinking is based on a systematic process, being able to derive certainty and pass that clarity on to others. McKenna failed to do so. He failed to check his ideas and remove the contradictions before he ever passed them on to others – as a habit.
I mentioned that I do give him credit for whatever insights I’ve gotten from him when due. If you hear my show, if I make a McKenna quote, I cite him for it. Is that the question I avoided?

Or about doing a show on him? I’ve done several. I’ve already answered that.
And what does “as we know it” mean, exactly? He doesn’t say. It’s arbitrary, undefined, nonsense.

“Questions are what I raised, not critiques as you accused me of. Seems like Terence is quite a sore spot for you like the missing scale in Smaugs belly.”

It’s a sore spot simply because every hippie out there constantly quotes McKenna for this and McKenna for that, and they’ve almost never read any of the other literature from the field, and as soon as they do they, then, realize that most of what he published was incorrect. Not to mention I wasted a lot of my own time in my 20s and early 30s getting caught up in that, before I realized it was a waste of time. His rants are cool, but a waste of time nonetheless if you don’t come away empowered.

Maybe McKenna peaked my interest to study entheogens, but I’d already read Allegro by the time I’d ever heard him. I’d already met Tim Leary, I’d already done psychedelics more than 200 times by then, I’d already worked with Jack Herer for years, so maybe I can give him credit for helping me to want to investigate these issues further, and the further I investigated, the less interested in McKenna’s ideas I became.

But all the time I hear about McKenna’s ideas on Amanita. He did it once or twice, did them wrong, and then told everyone Amanita couldn’t be Soma.

He took 5-MeO-DMT once, did it wrong, didn’t let go and told everyone how sucky it was. So every time I bring up 5-MeO-DMT, there’s always some knucklehead ready to quote McKenna’s “facts”.

On Allegro, on evolution, and on and on and on. He did some good work in being the first to grow psilocybe mushrooms indoors. He also did some good work on Ayahuasca. And when I want a bedtime story, he’s good there too, or for Finnigan’s Wake, but not for accuracy in detail on entheogens.

“So since you’ve decided to attack me this way why don’t we just purge this thing right now and let me enlighten you to a few ways in which you are dead wrong.”

You came here attacking me about dismissing McKenna… your guru or whatever, and that I should be softer on him because it’s 2012… that because it’s the year of the end of his BS theory, that for some unstated reason (appeal to fallacy) I should be nicer to him and not point out the bullshit sophism he used to sell such theories in the first place. I call bullshit.

I also like how you presume and call it an “end date” yourself. Your own agenda? It’s not an end date. It’s just the winter solstice. The sun dies every year… year in and year out.

“First off and to quote;
“But the problem comes in when people accept his ideas uncritically and as truth and go around defending everything he had to say, even to the very people who made his work available to people like you.”

“I am not the blind gullible follower you have you have made me out to be nor do I look to Terence as some sort of religious messiah nor did I try to defend anything he said.””

I didn’t make you out like that; you made yourself out like that by even posting the very two first posts to this show, not on the trivium, but on your whine about McKenna – all of the evidence of which is already up on my site.

“I have taken issue with many things he has proposed since I understood long ago that the realms he was speaking in was largely speculation not fact, the Timewave included.”

Really, then you should have said that, rather than what you did. But the problem is that most of his followers hang on every word as fact. Just as you believe his 2012 math hasn’t been debunked, when it was debunked when he was still alive.

“ And yes, I am aware that it was you who so graciously and unselfishly seeded Mckenna to the internet. This is gloating I have heard you go on about many times now – let it lay, everyone knows already.”

Really, how many times have I gone on about this, exactly? And who is this “everyone” who knows? You? And if you knew this, then why would you come here telling me what McKenna says and how I should act in the first place if you knew that I was the source of that information in the first place? Is it really gloating to point out the fact that the info came from here in the first place, where you’re trying to make your “corrections”? “Let me make a few corrections here.” I don’t really think you did make any corrections. You just stated some of your opinions.

And how come the up and coming McKenna festival website, that has links all over the site to download his audio material, doesn’t mention anyplace, even once, that most of it came from me, but has links to download it from people who pirated it FROM me? http://www.terence2012.com/

“Or maybe this is why you are so adamantly against him in the first place – because you feel somewhat responsible for spreading to so many the illogical and uncritical religion of Terence Mckenna.”

In some ways I’d say this is true. But more so because people like to get antsy every time anyone is critical of the guy and his BS, like 2012, that we covered already extensively, expecting me to hold him and his work to some higher regard/degree than it’s worth.

I didn’t criticize you. I ASKED you some questions. Maybe you should re-read and re-check the way you lambasted me without provocation. And I don’t know, call me blind but I have not seen or heard you credit him for anything- that’s why I don’t see it and the reason for my QUESTIONS.”

You asked me questions only after you told me how I should act and what I should do.
First off, the trivium is not my philosophy. It’s very ancient. I suggest you study it so that you see how McKenna doesn’t conform to it in most of his work. Don’t accept my opinion, see it for yourself.

Except for In Search Of, You didn’t ask me for the specific citations where we’ve already covered this stuff, which is found all over my website.

“To continue;
“I’ve already had Terence’s brother on my show and we already discussed much of this. So why not get fluent in the trivium and critical thinking and the fallacies and stop worshiping and defending the guy who sold a lot of BS in his stories? Take
what’s valid, point by point, and toss the rest”

Again let my words and yours speak for themselves. I did not defend/worship. This is hilarious. And speaking of Dennis and your interview, why didn’t you confront him on HIS part of the Timewave. To remind you, as you must have forgotten when you interviewed him, there is a book called The Invisible Landscape in which he co-authored/calculated the premise for the Timewave Zero.”

If you didn’t defend, you wouldn’t have made your post defending McKenna in the first place. I suppose you can call it not defending, but when someone writes two posts on my website defending someone, well, if it quacks like a duck…

And had you done your grammar and actually listened to my interview with Dennis before you made this reply, you’d know that Dennis admits that the 2012 and timewave zero theories were not his, but Terence’s, and Dennis just helped with some of the math and ideas at Terence’s request. He state’s clearly that 2012 and timewave zero were not his theories. So good luck with your reminder here. But facts are facts – straight from the horse’s mouth.

To quote;
“Terence isn’t alive and I’ll be happy to point out his bullshit anyway…just as anyone else… regardless if it’s 2012 or what ever other appeal to fallacies you want to use to justify bs. Dennis even came on my show and admitted that Terence eventually just sold the idea because it became popular”.
!?! This baffles be.

Why does it baffle you? Why don’t you just listen to the interview with Dennis and get your facts in order so that you’ve no need for emotional reactions or bafflement?

More;
“You don’t believe his math was debunked because you haven’t studied anything on it and you’re here to protect your religion. Terence was approached on the matter before his death and admitted, to his credit, that it was likely wrong.”

I am well aware of the Japanese mathematician who found a problem with his math and yes, Terence was thrilled and I believe, invited him to Hawaii to discuss. I am also aware that a year or so later another mathematics professor found flaws in that guys findings seemingly opening the thing back up (and this before Terence died) – but since I don’t understand high mathematics there is no way for me to conclude either way. I will try to resource that material and send to you. And again with your unfounded assumptions, I am not defending (or protecting, even more hilarious) a religion. You are some piece of work.

I didn’t realize that Matthew Watkins was Japanese. It’s a very American, British, or German sounding name. I posted the link already.

But using logic and the trivium, if it’s not proved, then it’s arguing the arbitrary and you can just toss it. That’s right, just toss it. That’s the rules of logic. If there’s no evidence to support something and the conclusions are mere speculation then you leave it at speculation and toss it and never mention it again until you have said proof. Until that time, it’s sophism and wasting everyone’s time… in the millions in this case. McKenna’s 2012 time point was also arbitrarily set. That means you can just toss it, too.

But you are in fact, protecting a religion. 2012 is nothing but a religion.

“Still more!!;”

God, really? Haven’t I already addressed enough of this nonsense? Must you have more?

“If you don’t think what I’ve said conforms the the trivium, it’s because you haven’t done your own grammar, haven’t studied it seriously, haven’t listened to the 3 2012 meme shows we did (much less the other 50+ interviews on entheogens), haven’t heard my interview with his brother, and haven’t really done any research at all to verify your beliefs. So rather than doing that on your own, you’ve come here to waste my time with this nonsense about your religious saint. Good luck with that. You won’t get any sympathy from me.

“You ASSUME I have not listened to all these other podcasts – I have followed your work since the release of The Pharmacratic Inquisition, collected and listened to (many of them multiple times) every single episode you have posted or been on. I have purchased and read both of your books including my original copy of SMATC and many many other books on the subject (I have a sizeable library).”

Doing your grammar on this specific topic is different than following each podcast of mine, or the PI DVD, which isn’t in discussion here, and is irrelevant. I’m speaking specifically of the 2012 meme shows we did, and the interview with Dennis. .. If you heard the interview with Dennis, then you’d already have known that 2012 and Timewave zero were Terence’s theories and you’d have not tried to “correct” me on it simply because Terence put Dennis’s name on the cover for his minimal input. What does your sizable library, or Allegro’s SMC have to do with THIS topic? As Allegro’s publisher, I can state with 100% certainty that Allegro never mentioned any such thing about 2012 or Timewave Zero. Again, your mention is completely beside the point and irrelevant to this conversation – fallacies.

“Beyond that, I have donated to your site and archives and bought merchandise.”

While I greatly appreciate your support, again, this bears nothing on doing your grammar for the 2012 meme and Timewave Zero and is a red herring and beside the point.

“ I have turned friends and family onto your podcast who have in turn done the same. I have done my share to support what you do sir.”

While I greatly appreciate your support, again, this bears nothing on doing your grammar for the 2012 meme and Timewave Zero and is a red herring and beside the point.

“And, to backtrack, speaking of your shows, are you actually suggesting that in order to get the truth the whole truth and nothing but – everyone is supposed to check here and let that be the final word? There is nothing but absolute truth here? Sorry man, but that sounds a bit ego-centric and you may want to keep that kind of talk in check.”

Where did I say this? That everyone is supposed to check here and let that be the final word? You love to leap to conclusions along with many other fallacies. That’s your own ego speaking – it’s a red herring, and a few other fallacies which evade me just now. But if you’re so familiar with my shows, you’d already know to avoid their use. So you’re putting words in my mouth here. I said I’ve interviewed over 50 leading experts on this subject, including McKenna’s own brother, and in fact we do have a systematic method we teach here to help people learn to discover the truth on their own – their own certainty. Repeat – ON THEIR OWN. You just haven’t utilized these tools yet to their full potential. It will happen with time. The trivium doesn’t teach people what to think, Mike, but HOW to think. It’s not the final word (another fallacy), it’s learning to process things properly through the trivium, through gathering data, processing through logic – on your own and learning not to use fallacies like these when you’re wrong about something. Your attempts here with all of this nonsense, DEFENDING McKenna, et al, on a talk about the trivium, which you clearly didn’t utilize before you wrote this, is what’s annoying. Had you utilized the very tools in the talk to this thread, we’d not be having this very conversation – as I in fact mentioned at the beginning of the show.

“I have researched plenty and pondered much more than I will give you the pleasure of knowing because I see now how you deal with things.”

You’ve used so many fallacies and false statements and wrong information, my apologies to you for offending if I somehow have for stating the facts of the matter. Religious (and emotional) people often get offended when confronted regarding their beliefs. But I didn’t ask you to provide me your ponderings. But here you’re attempting to use the guilt trip and other appeal to fallacies.

“You cannot even deal with simple questions without assassinating someones character that you don’t even know and make multiple unfounded mean spirited assumptions about them.”

Can you show me where I’ve assassinated your character? I’ve not made any personal attacks against you. I’ve just pointed out how your beliefs in McKenna are wrong and already covered on my show, and that you’re wasting my time, your time and everyone else’s time here with your red herring about McKenna in a thread about the trivium, which I also pointed out that you didn’t use when writing your posts.

And I did in fact, deal with your questions, even if I missed one, being annoyed with the entire thing in the first place.

“It’s exactly like Rush Limbaugh or an angry teenager when they get cornered with a question they cannot answer and have nowhere to turn but to insults, sarcasm and deformation of the initial point.”

You cornered me? Where? That’s absurd. You mean your fallacies here and your religious fundamentalist actions? Nice appeal to ridicule though. If you were more familiar with my show, you wouldn’t use fallacies like this throughout your reply. Please point out where I used insults, deformation, or anything else you claim.

“This is what the Trivium has taught you?”

The trivium has taught me that I should have just deleted your off topic, fundamentalist reply in the first place, rather than trying to get you facts on McKenna, to which you got hung up on in the first 30 seconds of the interview, apparently missing the next 2 hours.

“You have revealed your transparency at my expense and since we are on the subject, I will gladly don the hunch back cape and climb upon the pillory of the Terence Mckenna whipping post and let the cat-o-nine tails and flesh and blood fly if you, Mr. Irvin will don the cape of the sacred Trivium and answer the one question you so cleverly dodged to begin with – From what source did you derive that Terence Mckenna got his idea of the Timewave end date 2012 from Rod Serlings In Search Of… then go on to seed that information to the world in your talk with John Rush. Please answer this one question, if you can. I wonder if you will even have the balls to post this, to answer the question. Or is this the loose pebble keystone in the crumbling foundation that the house of cards that is the Superstar Jan Irvin rests upon?”

If you’d study this topic with emotional detachment, rather than getting yourself riled up in your defense of McKenna, you wouldn’t need to make more emotive fallacies here. If you stated your questions more clearly, cogently, coherently, it would also help you get them answered more efficiently so that you don’t have an excuse to make false accusations. I simply missed your question because you had two replies, neither of which were very clear – or on topic.

In fact, I’ve ALREADY CITED TO YOU IN MY FIRST REPLY my 3 shows on THE 2012 MEME. YOU’D HAVE ALREADY FOUND THAT SOURCE, RATHER THAN MAKING FALSE ACCURATIONS THAT I DIDN’T PROVIDE IT TO YOU, had you used the search function.

“If you don’t think what I’ve said conforms the the trivium, it’s because you haven’t done your own grammar, haven’t studied it seriously, haven’t listened to the 3 2012 meme shows we did (much less the other 50+ interviews on entheogens), haven’t heard my interview with his brother, and haven’t really done any research at all to verify your beliefs.”

Not John Rush, but in the 3 shows we did on the 2012 meme, Prof. John Hoopes, who’s been researching this entire nonsense for several years, it was he who traced the instance of 2011/2012 scenario on the first, premiere, episode of “In Search Of”. You can locate it and watch it for yourself.

Before that it was Prof. Michael Coe’s 1967 book from Yale on the Maya that everyone else took out of context from In Search Of, to McKenna, to Arguelles and then on down the line to Pinchbeck, Ian Lungold, Carl Calleman, and the others. The only good, serious researcher on this entire topic out there, as far as I can tell, is John Major Jenkins. He’s a very cogent, clear headed thinker.

Prof. Hoopes, Jenkins, and I, detailed out all of this information in those 3 shows, already mentioned to you, and we also shared all of this with Dennis, who, in fact, loaned Hoopes his first edition copy of Invisible Landscape and Hoopes and Dennis interacted extensively during the research.

Sorry if I missed your question in the first place. Your messages where so full of McKenna worship and nonsense that I didn’t read that far through one of responses.

““Good luck with that.”
p.s. I do not require sympathy from someone who is seemingly unable to give it in the first place. A little humility and compassion goes a long way. Try practicing that for awhile and incorporate it into your Trivium method.”

Not trying to give you sympathy, Mike, just pointing out that you’re really upset and emotional over your religion and its saintly hero being challenged. Again, good luck with that. Next time, do your grammar first.

It is important, when evaluating Terence, to realize that he was not a scientist, a philosopher, an ethnobotanist, or an anthropologist. those are disciplines in which a certain, often rigorous, methodology is required to frame whatever is being said or studied. Terence was a poet, a bard, and he was Irish. his goal was to provoke thought, inspire, and entertain. truth was not his forte. you don’t hold poets to standards of truth the way you hold philosophers or scientists. he frequently just made stuff up if it sounded good and would get him admirers. timothy leary was the same way–although Tim at an early point in his career was in fact a scientist, a psychologist–but he abandoned that career to be an entertainer and rabble rouser. don’t get me wrong. i say this not to criticize my two deceased, beloved friends… they would agree. terence once told me that when he was a kid he used to play this game with his friends in his garage. someone would come up with a topic and the goal was to talk about it, try to convince everyone that you actually knew what you were talking about. you got points for being convincing, not truthful. terence always won. tim leary was the same. from him i learned there are facts, and there are lies, and there are “Irish facts,” affectionately known, which are not true, but are at least funny and or provocative… Tim and Terence were full of them…

Edit: I should also point out that it’s still sophism. It’s fine when it’s presented as poetry and story and pose, but when it’s presented as (pseudo)science, that’s what I take issue with. I’m not against when Terence told stories, I’m against telling stories as fact and creating memes that have mislead millions of people. I think Terence would have been appalled out how out of control this 2012 thing has gotten.

Sorry to be “off topic” (although to claim that this thread could somehow only support a discussion about one topic I think would be the fallacy known as a false dilemma) but in his published writings and the hundreds of hours of his talks I have listened to (thanks Jan), McKenna did not once present the Timewave as science. At best he characterized it as a psychedelic artifact, more often as simply a crazy theory that he wished to be disproven and debunked. From memory, he ALWAYS made this disclaimer before presenting the Timewave. Therefore, in regards to the nature of the Timewave (some of the specifics may be another matter) he was, it seems to be, honest, and not a BSer as Jan has characterized him.

McKenna’s cutting social criticism and his insights and his ability to phrase these thoughts are why he deserves so much credit. And for that stuff, he’s still as relevant as ever. The 2012 theory was always too fringe to really buy anyway, so I dropped that part a long time ago.

And listening to Jan is a a similar exercise in not “throwing the baby out with the bathwater”, as I think some of Jan’s conclusions are bullshit also. You gotta take them both with a little salt.

Hi Bruce, since I have provided my information and sources, if you think some of my ideas are bullshit, then the onus of proof is on you to back that statement. Thanks.

And McKenna believed that there could be no controlling elite or NWO – another thing he was completely wrong about. .. so which social criticisms? Certainly he had many, and sure there are some I agree with… but he was against culture and the like. I’m not so sure I’d even support that anymore.

But anyway, I’m getting really annoyed with all of the off topic replies here. This show is about the trivium with Gene Odening. Would it be possible to focus on THIS topic and not McKenna, which this show is not about?

Just to clarify, I don’t think your published ideas (the ones I’ve read in your books) are bullshit. I didn’t mean that to sound like a personal attack.
I meant some of the conspiracy theories you seem to be on board with, but it’s off topic like you said, and it would be a waste of time to drag out another internet debate about those topics.
That’s all. You can delete this one if you want, I just wanted to clarify what I was addressing. And thanks for the podcast BTW.

Which “conspiracy theories”? What grammar did you do on them? What citations did you request about them to verify if they were bullshit, or if you just hadn’t studied them sufficiently?

I point out that using a term “conspiracy theory” is designed to automatically make the person sound like they’re full of bullshit, without even looking at anything – which is a fallacy. It’s sort of an ad hominem or appeal to ridicule.

How do you move back and forward on the player ?
When I try to drag the time line it jumps right back to where it was and does not continue
from the new time point.
Please let me know if there is a special way to do it.

It’s an issue with your browser. Possibly an update or something. It should be working fine, as no one has said anything. You can try a different browser, or just download the file to your computer and play it with what ever player you prefer.

Great interview Jan, thank you very much! I always enjoy listening to the logic and rational of Mr. Odening. His clarification of (his perception of) the trivium (and whats beyond) supported by clear and patient rhetoric represents another ‘candle illuminating yet another portion of the darkness’ to me.

I have to admit that I was relieved to finally hear an interview of this kind again on your show. Besides the (great) 5 hour John Taylor Gatto interview + commentary you posted, all I heard lately were health-related shows, something I myself have little interest in – of course the specific interests of one listener are of little relevance to your show, just wanted to share my appreciation for stepping aside from the health topic.

I was a bit disappointed when reading the comments under this interview. Saw 20+ comments so expected a nice on-topic discussion, only to find a discussion about Terrance McKenna. To be honest, I am of the opinion that this reveals a lack of respect for the interviewed, Mr Odening, who humbly shares his knowledge and analysis with the people. Even though I thought the argumentation was at times a little aggressive & lacking context, I overstand your irritation with people starting a discussion on TM only because you quickly mentioned his TW0 theory as an entertaining introduction to the topic of the show. Maybe its an idea to make an appeal to your audience, asking them to use the comment board for relevant discussions only… Aah but here I go myself, wasting all this space on the same issue.

So I leave you with another note of appreciation, in the hope that more interviews of a similar kind will follow. Greetings

Thanks again to Jan and Gene for following up on the Trivium, very much appreciated. I’d like to add the inclusion of “getting things done” into the reading list was a brilliant idea and is really helping me get more organised for this.

I do not think it is a matter of reading Sis. Miriam Joseph’s book in a certain order, it is a matter of difficult language or terminology.

Gene mentioned that if you know Latin, you could probably read SMJ’s book straight through as a narrative, or “linearly”. Her terminology is essentially Latinzed English derived from the medieval Scholastic Tradition that used pure Latin and which became favored by the Roman Church. I mostly used the more modern terminology in “Introduction to Logic” book, by Copi & Cohen, to get explanations of Logic, the most challenging of the 3 trivium subjects to come to know, and then used the “Trivium” book as a reference work to further contrast and clarify terms encountered in other works. Use SMJ’s “Trivium” index for this purpose. Jan also referred to other modern works which may help in your coming to an understanding of the various trivium branches.

However, the first 3 chapters of SMJ’s book can be read straight through for a really fine explanation of the difference between General Grammar (the 1st branch of the trivium) and special grammar. Until you read these chapters, you would not know that there was a distinction or that there are more than one type of grammar!

That’s where I’m at in the book, about the end of the 3rd chapter. I thought I was getting it ok, but when I heard Gene’s comment (and recognizing the subtitle stating things out of order) I wondered if I should approach the book differently. I have not obtained a copy of Copi/Cohen’s “Introduction to Logic” but I do have Peikoff’s lecture as a basis of understanding the Logic portion.

So far so good! I’ll just continue to plow through it. Thanks for helping and answering my concern, Quint!

Sorry I haven’t. I actually quite like some of the things I’ve heard from him, but it seemed like he always came down to a similar “we’re doomed” sort of conclusion. Since you’ve mentioned it, I will look into his newer stuff. There is a lot of stuff to listen to out there. Easy to miss new work. Does he really have a brighter outlook for the future? No need to get testy, I’ll check it out myself.

I would like to address the actual content of the interview this thread is connected to. I found it quite informative. The idea that some will come around to this without actually studying the material, but simply by knowing about it over time is interesting. After listening to the initial interviews with Gene, and the follow ups concerning logic and the quadrivium I have to say that I have felt like this is something I have always kind of known, intuitively. The idea that it is not some system, but a physical structure, simply a discription of how we think, makes a lot of sense. I wonder how different our workld would be if this was tought in school? I also wonder if it would be possible to fit into a curriculum similar to the one used most often at present?

I sometimes feel like if the options discussed in these type of podcasts were implimented the society which followed would be so different as to be unrecognizable. If the percentage of people thinking critically expanded from say the five percent it is today (and I believe that to be a high estimate) to say twenty percent, things would be drastically different, but the tide would still lean to the irrational mass of the population. If it were say at ninety-five percent, and the five left over were those who simply could not, for structural reasons, what would it be like? I can’t imagine. I can speculate, but whenever I do I wind up coming to the same conclusions as some deep ecologists I have read, or The likes of Mr. Ruppert with his Collapse concept, similar to that of Greer with his The Long Decent and Eco-Technic Future. The idea that if rationality would prevail, our destructive ways would be untenable and when foregone would result in a rapid decline of civilization due to the lack of ethically available resources for consumption.

That aside, I need to listen to this interview again before I can comment further without diverging any more from the content of the talk.

Amazon offers the audio book for free with a trial subscription to Audible. You can keep the book download even if you cancel the subscription.

The only downside is it is not in a regular mp3 format. You have to download their Audible Download Manager software and it then it will play on your computer. It will also allow you to upload it into your ipod, mp3 player, etc.

Hi Jan! I love your work it’s really great, and this comment has nothing to do with McKenna, but very generally, do you think that by conforming so rigidly to the trivium that it is possible you are also closing yourself off to other sources of insight and inspiration? For example the speed reading might detract from the full experience and enjoyment of reading, and also simply enjoying a conversation with a person and enjoying their company. What about the eastern wisdom, eastern philosophy and the idea that your mind can work at it’s full capacity when it is unhinged and undirected by structures of thoughts, or even any volitional thoughts at all? What are your thoughts on meditation as the definition of allowing the mind to do what it does, think what it will and go where it will.

if you are always looking through the eyes of the trivium do you lose your own vision, or is it simply an enhancement? I just ask because you clearly are so much well versed in the subject than I and carry a lot more experience. But surely emulating one civilization from the past is not the smartest approach, what do you think?

See this is my point Jan, I am not trying to prove I am right or wrong but simply engage in friendly philosophical discourse. It’s not a matter of win or fail, that doesn’t enter into it. You are treating this like an attack, but all of my questions are hypotheticals and I clearly state I am new to the subject, so youre honestly just being mean. If you know this material so well then can you not speak civily and explain your positions? This makes me believe that what I posited – posited – again, posited – not asserted, may in fact be true. And I did not say in any way shape or form that because the civilization was in the past it has no merit, I am saying it may not be wise to take the wisdom from just one society when there is so much wisdom in all the world we can uncover.

I don’t like this response man, not one bit, I did not come in here stating the world is such and such and claim to make assertions, I have made only inquiries seeking your wisdom and one of my questions was whether you stop enjoying things like conversation and reading as much because of these structures of thought, and it’s sad to say but your response is making me believe this is true. Even so I would not discount any of this material and that was not my intention coming in here I am simply looking for the best way to use this wisdom.

I want to clariy, when I say by conforming so rigidly to the trivium you close yoruself off to other inspirations and insights my inquiry truthfully has nothing to do with the value of the trivium persay, but rather a general inquiry, as I stated, about training your mind to operate consistantly in one particular manner. I didn’t mean to imply that I think the methods of the trivium minimize the faculties of the mind, not at all because I truly recognize the benefits and implications of it, my question is whether by conforming to ANY thought pattern at all, any ritual, and dogma, whatever you may call it, that you restrict the full spectrum of life’s joys and insights and possibilities. The fact that you have so misinterpreted my comment is very strange because you tout the merits of proper reading and you have not understood me in the slightest. Again I will restate my question is not so much about the trivium as it is about neuro-psycho architecture that we create through perception and practice.

So in your very first line or reply “If you understood the trivium, you wouldn’t make such a comment.” it contains a serious misinterpretation. I am not making comments, I am making inquiries because I thought you would have something insightful to say on the benefits or drawbacks of practicing a ritual form of thought. If you mean to state that the trivium does not fall into this diction, then why not just say so? The fact that you haven’t and instead just go on to claim I don’t understand eastern wisdom and that I don’t understand speed reading or the trivium is actually really sad and I don’t mean sad pathetic but it just makes me sad because I hoped for a much more open minded reply, but you won’t explain yourself and instead you judge me and that doesn’t even line up with the wisdom that this whole site is based upon.

Christopher

January 23, 2012 at 4:57 pm

It’s just pure defensiveness with very little substance, you’re not even using the fucking trivium in this comment! If you put out all this knowledge on the subject it’s not unreasonable to think you are capable of using it on the fly in any form of discouse, but instead you just brush it aside with baseless judgements that carry no explanation. These are essentially ad homonym attacks directed at me because you’re just saying “you’re wrong, you don’t understand” and that is seriously lame! Where are the fruits of your labor?

Jan Irvin

January 23, 2012 at 5:39 pm

Chris,

I didn’t misinterpret your comment. I went line by line and responded to it.

Again, next time before you judge something, study it. It’s simple, common sense.

Your first comment was so confused and confounded from not even hearing the interview before you commented that it’s just noise… and now you’re applying more noise on top.

4x worth.

Your inquires were addressed in the trivium material. Rather than taking up my time with inquires, comments, and judgements that are completely off mark, why not study it for yourself and figure it out first?

I completely reject the premises of your inquires, your posits, your what have yous… the trivium itself would have answered them had you listened in the first place.

It’s not a ritual or a dogma. It’s a systematic method of knowing and fact checking information. It’s studying something before you judge it or ask questions about what it effects, when the information is already before you. The trivium asks simply who what were when, then understands why, before it explains how. It’s no ritual or dogma, it’s a way of fact checking information before leaping to false conclusions as you repeatedly have here.

If you want to think your fallacies regarding it somewhat restrict “the full spectrum of life’s joys and insights and possibilities” then that’s your misinterpretation that you’re more than welcome to live on with… due to not utilizing the very methods to fact check such thoughts in the first place. Again, see the interview you skipped right past. But the trivium itself is against this type of confused proposition at it’s core, which I already stated above. The trivium requires that you’d have actually listened to the interview before positing fallacy based assumptions about it.

I have understood about reading, because I took a speed reading class on this very issue, and if done right, like the trivium, does not take away from what one reads…

What exactly do you understand of speed reading? Whose method did you study? I already asked you this question. One method is not the same as every other. You clump things together… like Eastern Religions and the trivium method.

My comment does not contain a serious misinterpretation, but rather, your ignorance of the trivium itself contains the misinterpretations. That’s what you’re failing to understand. You’re also failing to understand that you’re inconsiderate for asking such ridiculous questions without hearing the interview(s) on this subject first.

If you think it’s a ritual form of thought, it only further shows your own lack of study and ignorance of the entire matter.

If you had studied it in the first place, you wouldn’t need me to just say so… I find it a waste of my time when the very subject that corrects this type of assumptive thinking is ignored for the assumptions anyway, taking up my time, as if I have all day to answer to your inquiries that were answered in the interview in the first place. Again, stop being inconsiderate, lazy for that matter, and just look at the material yourself, and then you won’t need any ad vericundiam fallacies to answer it for you.

The fact that you would confuse and confound the trivium, and then compare it to what you’ve cherry picked from Eastern Philosophy, which is also old and from another, older civilization, by the way, shows that you don’t understand either. The trivium also comes from Eastern philosophical traditions.

If you want open minded replies, I’d start with questions that don’t lead to all sorts of false assumptions based on your lack of studying the very interview you’re attempting to question… and it’s a part 4, for that matter, which means that there are 3 previous interviews with the same guest that also serve to answer your questions that you didn’t need to ask had you just studied them.

The wisdom this site is based on is a wisdom of people hearing, reading, studying before leaping to false conclusions about things. Your questions/comments were not in line with that focus simply because you wanted to leap to conclusions about the topic without having first studied it… taking up my time, being inconsiderate, when, again, you could have just pressed play.

My thoughts, again, on this topic, are explained in the many hundreds of hours of material here, on Peace Revolution, and the many radio interviews I’ve done, books, also available here.

I am using the trivium, but tire of people who refuse to.

If you had studied the material first, before posing your questions, they would have been answered in the first place, and you wouldn’t need to say that I’m not using the trivium by dismissing your off base, out of this world, false judgements about what it is.

They’re not ad hominem attacks. That’s your own misapplication of the topic from not having studied it.

You judged me that I don’t like company or conversation. That’s ridiculous. Where did you come up with that? Speaking of leaping to false conclusions and more fallacies.

You started off your whole message about McKenna… again, not the best place to start, as has already been repeated, and we did numerous shows on this topic.

Regarding meditation, I already said to read our book, hear the other shows, etc.

Then your comment about past civilizations… that’s an appeal to novelty fallacy and is absurd and baseless at its premise.

Yup, just about everything in my first comment still stands… you have to study something first before you can judge it.. .which is EXACTLY what the trivium is about… exactly the opposite to your approach.

Christopher

January 23, 2012 at 5:46 pm

Okay I haven’t even read the full reply yet and again on the second line I see a glaring problem, you are saying I judged something without studying it. I came on her plaintively stating my lack of experience in the subject and asked you a series of questions on it, I made no judgements whatsoever in my first comment and thats what is so disheratening that you cannot understand that I am simply asking you to look beyond the trivium so that I can gauge it’s value and worth as it pertains to your experience. I’ll read the rest of this later.

What I just did right there, when I say I didn’t judge anything, I recognize that it is possible that I unwittingly am seeing the Trivium in a false light, thereby making my comments imposing, and it is possible that you do in fact explain that the very way I phrased my questions about the trivium betray a judgement or misperception I did not see myself, and by not reading the entire thing I do recognize I am not applying the first pillar of the trivium ok I understand that. But the nature of my question is such that the answer becomes apparent when you will not speak to me civily because I do not think like you do, and the fact is I am sitting here asking you if it’s worthwhile that I do so.

So I’ll be fair and acknoweldge that by not reading your last comment I am not being honest, but I’m telling you I will and I hope something beneficial will come of this.

“For example the speed reading might detract from the full experience and enjoyment”

They keyword is might!

Jan Irvin

January 23, 2012 at 6:34 pm

Christopher, as has been repeated, and is what the trivium is about, please hear the interview before commenting again. Thanks.

Jan Irvin

January 23, 2012 at 6:38 pm

Now you’re getting close… but I did in fact answer you civily…

The point is, I don’t want you to ask me questions. I want you to press the play button and study it FIRST and THEN after you’ve HEARD it, ask INTELLIGENT questions AFTER.

Get on the same page first… that’s what it’s all about!

Jan Irvin

January 23, 2012 at 6:27 pm

What’s disheartening, is that you commented before studying it… that’s the entire point…

THAT’S WHAT THE TRIVIUM IS!!! LEARNING TO STUDY THINGS BEFORE LEAPING TO CONCLUSIONS, OR COMING TO FALSE IDEAS ABOUT WHAT IT IS, AND THEN WASTING OTHER PEOPLE’S TIME BECAUSE YOU REFUSE TO TAKE YOUR OWN TIME TO STUDY IT!

Holy dancing bunnies! And I thought I was annoying, I was thinking of starting up my own blog and perhaps a podcast. But then I read these comments. Which I imagine are nowhere near the most brutal ones floating around. I am extremely new to all this trivium stuff, but there seems to be an awful lot of putting the cart before the horse here. I may be an uneducated lout, but at least I can appreciate the work of mr Odening and mr Irvin. Also, haven’t you people seen the movie? Don’t you know that believing in the whole 2012 thing is just believing we are all doomed unless we live in South Africa or have a submarine or something?

Are you saying that what Mr. O says is ‘absolute truth’ and there is no other view points on that subject.
Are there no other kabbalistic groups whom can refute some of Mr.O’s assumptions?
Aren’t you coming hard on a suggestion (and me) cause that stroke a weak cord Jan?
What would be wrong if some other kabbalist wanted to debate some aspects of Mr.O’s beliefs. Are you runing a church or an outlet for (hu)man evolution?
And No, there was no logical fallacies, but a call for open exchange of ideas for the betterment of society! Isn’t that what golden dawn strives for.

The golden dawn is a secret society. Groups occult things (make them secret) for their own gain, not for the empowerment of others. The very purpose of occultation is to hold something over others. You must not have researched the origins of the Golden Dawn, and you must not be very familiar with the work around here.

It also seems clear that you’ve not studied the trivium, quadrivium, etc, and seem not to understand what it is. You’re here whining about the kabbalah on a thread about the trivium.

If you have specific issues with how Odening teaches the Qabalah, you should study the prerequisite shows, as the Qabalah is the 3rd and not the first in the series (episodes 49-51), which build on each other and use a systematic method of fact checking the information – called the trivium. The very episodes you’ve clearly not yet grasped and are yelling for a debate about.

Mr. Odening never once claims any sort of absolute truth. If this is the conclusion you came to, you must not have been listening very carefully. As Mr. Odening, as well as us on the many shows here on the trivium, have made it quite clear that the trivium is a system of HOW to think, NOT what to think. So the very premise of your declaration is absurd and ignorant.

What of Gene’s “assumptions” are you wanting to refute? The onus of proof is on you – first off to even show them as assumptions. Just post up your citations and exactly how you think the information is wrong, rather than declaring a need for debate. That’s the intelligent approach, not to mention just common sense. If you can’t prove your issues yourself, then you’re arguing the arbitrary and you’re dismissed at face value – as is common logic. But again, first you’d have to gain a firm understanding of the trivium and quadrivium. If the Golden Dawn hasn’t taught it to you properly, or at all, then, again, that’s why they’re a secret society and not for the betterment of society.

It doesn’t strike a weak cord, what strikes a weak cord is that you’ve come here with no evidence of anything demanding a debate over something you clearly haven’t studied and thoroughly misunderstand, and can’t even back your claims yourself as far as I can tell.

Tell us, tcenna, what exactly is the trivium, how does it work, how does it function to fact check information, what are the components, what is the proper order? What is the quadrivium? How does it work? what does it do? What are its components? what is the proper order? How, from there, do these two fit into the Qabalah? Furthermore, are you discussing Hermetic Kabbalah, as you clearly are with your spelling, which was designed for secrecy, or one of the other methods? Who have you studied? Did you study the sources on the Qabalah that Odening cited, or are you arguing from ignorance of not having studied the same sources and are therefore not on the same page of the information? Any debate with someone who isn’t on the same page and refuses to study the same information first is a futile practice of debating someone who’d rather chase their tail.

Around here we use critical thinking, we supply the onus of proof, and we dismiss fallacies. You’ve not managed any of these.

Furthermore, your use of the neglected aspect is dismissed as well. We’re not a church or an outlet for human evolution – as you so ignorantly claim. We’re here to educate and help people to think. If you didn’t grasp that, then maybe your cult is a better place for you.

Try getting familiar with the work around here and what you’re even talking about and what you’re up against before you even get started with your calls for debate.

well, once more you prove your arrogance in your church ‘around here’! ‘up against’? are you threatening commentators in your ‘school’? you gone call ‘satan’ on me or your ‘god’ will hunt me or your friends in some agency??? from “geezez is a mushroom” to “occult expert” ey? what a journey!?
make a popupfallacy of your own comment. what’s the point, you wont have the guts to publish and will surely censure my comment. take a good look at yourself in the mirror and grow up!

Alex Lugo

February 6, 2012 at 4:56 pm

Hello Jan! Would like to ask does the book Tyranny of Words by Stuart Chase ring a bell? Check it out very much linked into Trivium and Quadrivium, also another person worth posting Alfred Korzybski who wrote the book Science and Sanity and many more. Let me know what you think, cause something nice to point out when talking of The Trivium and Quadrivium. Also sorry in one of the podcast with Gene Odening something got mentioned about speed reading, any links on this on how to develop it and\or enchant it? Peace.

I know my post is a little late, but it’s somewhat relevant. I would like to say thank you Jan for releasing the Mckenna archive. Because he was a wonderful story teller, the ideas no matter how “funny”, are delivered in an effective manner. Even though he gets some things wrong, his style makes it easily accessible for someone with a faint glow of curiosity to do their own research and look deeper into what he was saying. Kind of like lighting the way. His talk on the hermetic tradition has led me to so many sources including John Allegro, Carl Ruck, which has lead me to Jan Irvin during my quest. I always take everything I hear with a grain of salt, something akin to, “believe in nothing that you hear, and only half of what you see”. I got this attitude from my own experience of listening to the band Tool which always promotes thinking for yourself. Anyway, I said this post was relevant, but I digress. I felt I had to put my opinion into the conversation on Terence and a well deserved thank you was in order. My point is that the band Tool has their hands in some of these mysteries and their most recent album at the time of this writing has a link to the Qabalah. http://www.toolband.com/news/letter/index.php (unless your’re bored… scroll to E-MAIL SUBJECT: “10,000 DAYS PUZZLE)
Just found it interesting and thought I would share.

I’ve just finished reading this whole thread on Terrence McKenna. While I know something of him and his work I always took what he said with a lump of salt followed by a Tequila and Lime!

The only thing that springs to mind that holds true is the following quote by Terrence from the Lyrics of a piece of Music called Re:Evolution by the Scottish Band, The Shamen. listen here…http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FAQVkEI2VrY (skip forward to 08seconds in from the start).

“If the truth can be told, so as to be understood, it will be believed”. TM.

I don’t know why but at the time I first heard this, I found it quite profound.